NaturalNews.com | Developing a renewable energy system that creates energy independence and even a considerable new source of revenue is not some sort of sci-fi pipe dream. BioCycle reports that the German village of Wildpoldsried, population 2,600, has had such incredible success in building its renewable energy system. Wildpoldsried generates 321 percent more renewable energy than it uses, and it now sells the excess back to the national power grid for roughly $5.7 million in additional revenue every single year.

WSJ | Maurice R. "Hank" Greenberg, the longtime former chief executive of American International Group Inc., launched a legal challenge to the government's 2008 takeover of AIG, alleging the move was unconstitutional.Mr. Greenberg's lawyers on Monday sued the U.S. and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on behalf of Starr International Co. and other AIG shareholders. The lawsuits accused the Treasury Department and New York Fed of wrongly taking control of the insurer and using it as a vehicle to funnel tens of billions of dollars to AIG's trading partners, which included large U.S. and European banks.

WeeklyStandard.com | General Electric, one of the largest corporations in America, filed a whopping 57,000-page federal tax return earlier this year but didn't pay taxes on $14 billion in profits. The return, which was filed electronically, would have been 19 feet high if printed out and stacked.

Mother Jones | After Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, and Morgan Stanley announced hefty profits in the fall of 2009, the Obama administration's pay czar said that he'd cap pay at Citigroup, Bank of America, and five other bailed-out companies. The move was largely symbolic: It capped salaries for only 25 executives, kept big stock bonuses in place, and did nothing to address the culture of rewarding folks who sowed our economic destruction. Below, some of the players who made out like bandits during the bubble and the bailout. 

 NY Post | Another one of President Obama’s “green jobs” companies has bitten the dust. Massachusetts-based Beacon Power Corp., which got a $43 million loan from the Department of Energy, filed for bankruptcy over the weekend -- sparking new questions about the troubled green-energy loan program.

Bloomberg | The U.S. Internal Revenue Service is auditing how Google Inc. (GOOG) avoided federal income taxes by shifting profit into offshore subsidiaries, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The agency is bringing more than typical scrutiny to how the company valued software rights and other intellectual property it licensed abroad, said the person, who requested anonymity because the audit isn’t public. The IRS has requested information from Google about its offshore deals after three acquisitions, including its $1.65 billion purchase of YouTube, the person said. The transfer overseas of these kinds of rights has enabled Google to attribute earnings to foreign units that pay lower taxes, Bloomberg News reported a year ago.

Jpmorganchase.com | JPMorgan Chase recently donated an unprecedented $4.6 million to the New York City Police Foundation. The gift was the largest in the history of the foundation and will enable the New York City Police Department to strengthen security in the Big Apple. The money will pay for 1,000 new patrol car laptops, as well as security monitoring software in the NYPD's main data center.

Miami Herald | Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is getting into the for-profit disaster response business. A veteran of emergency response operations -- having personally weathered Hurricane Andrew and then shepherded the state through 7 mega-hurricanes as governor -- Bush has joined forces with O'Brien's Response Management, an emergency planning company, according to a story in the Maritime Executive on its web site today.

Mother Jones | The United States cannot fully account for more than 16,000 kilograms tons of weapons-grade uranium and plutonium that it has shipped to 27 "friendly" countries in recent decades, and it lacks any coherent policy to track down the materials, a Government Accountability Office report concluded late last week. In fact, according to auditors, the country's atomic accounting is so shoddy that the International Atomic Energy Agency—the same agency sent to search for Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction—could potentially find the United States in violation of its international anti-proliferation treaty obligations. Even as it has fretted about Iranian nuclear proliferation and alleged Iraqi purchases of yellowcake uranium from Africa, the United States has lost track of enough fissile material to make hundreds of nuclear warhead cores.

USA TODAY | The number of businesses approved to accept food stamps grew by a third from 2005 to 2010, U.S. Department of Agriculture records show, as vendors from convenience and dollar discount stores to gas stations and pharmacies increasingly joined the growing entitlement program.

Bloomberg | Twenty-five of the best-paid chief executive officers in the U.S. earned more in salary and other compensation in 2010 than their companies’ federal income tax expenses as disclosed in public filings, according to a report by the Institute for Policy Studies.

Telegraph | The 1943 file, revealed in a book published on Wednesday by Swedish journalist Elisabeth Åsbrink, will revive the long-standing controversy over the far right sympathies of the 85-year-old businessman. It proves for the first time that Mr Kamprad was an active member of Svensk Socialistisk Samling – the successor to the Swedish Nationalist Socialist Workers Party – even detailing his membership number, 4013.

Market Watch | There is a rumor circulated on Wall St. that JP Morgan (NYSE: JPM) will takeover Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) within the week. The government will support the deal with a $100 billion investment in preferred shares issued by the combined entity. Alternatively, the government may guarantee the value of a large pool of Bank of America assets. The word is that Treasury Secretary Geithner has discussed the transaction with JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon.The "merger" would completely destroy the value of BAC's common shares.

Fox News | Bank of America Corp. is cutting 3,500 jobs in the current quarter and working on a broader restructuring that could eliminate thousands of additional positions, The Wall Street Journal reported in its Friday edition, citing people familiar with the situation. The 3,500 positions are spread across the nation's largest bank by assets, including investment banking and trading, and the cuts are expected to be completed by the end of September. Some employees already have been notified.

Mrdon-myworld.blogspot.com | Analysts expect General Electric Co (GE.N) to report a 13 percent rise in net profit on Friday, with strong demand from emerging markets continuing to offset weak U.S. demand and its slimmed-down finance arm. The largest U.S. conglomerate is experiencing strong demand for a variety of its heavy equipment, from aircraft engines, to gas turbines, to gear used in producing oil and natural gas, company officials have said.